... about Charades

Charades was made "popular" by Lionel Blair nobody is sure why he decided it was worth doing but it has been suggested that it was a drunken bet with his brother, Tony.

It's a simple game to play, the opening stage of the game is probably the best bit: firstly an over excited family member (and yes it's usually my mum, for which I apologise) will insist that "we all play a game!" usually because it's Christmas or New Year which means we have to tolerate each others company as a family without resorting to the TV.
At this point the other players make desperate excuses as to why they can't play a game... these hopeless gambits will ultimately fail because we don't want to ruin Christmas for mother, do we?
Next comes a second round of desperation whilst the family tries to agree on a half-enjoyable game, inevitably this is just a delaying tactic and will fail. Some idiot (or my mum) will suggest Charades this will be received with icy stares, more excuses, and a quick recreation of the Goldfinger sketch from the Christmas episode of Bottom (charades starts about halfway through).
The game itself is something of a let down after all that excitement!

There are 2 ways to make charades considerably better:
1) Make it as hard as possible to guess, acting like an idiot is the best part of the game, enjoy it, give in and ham it up for all your worth. On this note its worth mentioning that one of the funniest charades I've ever seen was the Blob which contained no clues other than the person involved behaving like a blob for about quarter of an hour!
2) Make it random, buy yourself a big book o' films and pick from it at random. This works even better if the book has foreign films in it!

By now you're probably itching to play so here are a couple to wet your beak, see if you can guess them:

Charade 1

Raises right hand and makes circle in front of eye. Left cranks handle at side of head.
Raises 3 fingers.
Raises 1 finger. Slaps forehead with palm of right hand.
Raises 2 fingers. Pulls at earlobe. Puts pinky finger to corner of mouth, then cradles something with left arm makes motions above it with right hand. Points at self, performs motions again, points at self.
Raises 3 fingers. Puts 3 fingers against forearm.
Puts 1 finger against forearm. Pulls at earlobe. Walks around slowly with back slightly bent and right arm trailing (45 degrees backwards and downwards).
Puts 2 fingers against forearm. Points towards viewer
Puts 3 fingers against forearm. Pulls at earlobe. makes L shape with hand as the viewer sees it one of the bars points down the other points right.

That's it!


Charade 2

Traces rectangular symbol in air around face.
Holds up 2 fingers.
Holds up 1 finger. Taps one finger on arm.
Holds hand above head and wiggles fingers, in imitation of rain. Raises one arm and rubs armpit with hand. Rubs chest and face. Points to item in rubbing hand.
Taps 2 fingers on arm. Bends legs so almost squatting, then rises. Continues to do this, moving up and down.
Holds up 2 fingers. Taps 1 finger on arm. Makes rectangular symbol again with fingers in air.
Taps 2 fingers on arm. Puts out tongue and nods head, like tired dog.

Finish!